Dogs

So we have a sweet dog, Sadie. She was rescued from being euthanized twice before we picked her up from Fireplug Rescue. She is maybe the sweetest dog I've ever had. When we got her, we were told she was afraid of thunderstorms, but "give her a Benadryl, and she'll be fine."

Whatever.

Benadryl did nothing. Two did nothing. It's a blast when you are trying to sleep, and the storm comes through at two in the morning. She used to jump up on the bed, walk across whatever bodies happened to be laying there, and jump down. She either turned around, jumped right back up, and did it again, or walked around the bed, and did it from the same side again.

The vet prescribed "doggy Xanax", and she "should be fine". That did nothing. So he prescribed Valium. No effect. Finally, he gave us Ace-Promazine. It's what they give dogs just before they put them completely out for surgery. When she is on the drug, she barely functions. She staggers around, and looks half asleep.

Perfect...until the first clap of thunder, and it's like she has nothing at all. She has progressed from just jumping on the bed to stepping, standing or climbing on your stomach, chest, or face.

"Yes, Sadie, we are aware it's storming, but thanks for making sure we know about it."

Nothing will console her.

If we are both gone, as we both are most of the day, since we both work, Sadie decides she has to get somewhere. She isn't sure where. She just knows it isn't where she is at the moment. She's smart enough to know a closed door leads to somewhere else, but apparently not smart enough to know it is just a bedroom, and the thunder is just as loud in there.

A few years ago, we lived in a house with a cat door leading out to the garage. It was 5" x 8". She tried several times to get into the garage. She knew we left that way, so I guess she wanted to come find us. The cat door had a plastic piece that closed the opening, and she learned how to get that out of the way. So I super-glued it shut. That didn't even slow her down. So I bought the industrial epoxy, use this, and it will NEVER come undone. Not a problem for Super Sadie.

During a storm one day, we lost a solar screen from the upstairs bedroom. It was a 48" x 72". The screen was in perfect shape. The clips that held it to the house had broken. So I set it outside in the garage. I'm pretty sure it was at least a couple of feet from the door. We came home to find it was inside the laundry room, and had been torn to shreds. How a 48 pound dog manages to pull that big screen through that tiny opening is still a mystery.

In another storm at our current house, she decided she didn't like the living room blinds, or that they were somehow making the thunder louder. So she basically shredded them.  Thankfully, she stopped there, before she tried to shred the window.

A few weeks ago, we came home to find the carpet in the bedroom hallway had been pulled up, and a large portion had been shredded.  We think Pepper (our other dog) helped her actually tearing the carpet into strips. Pepper was rescued from the side of the road, and we drove an hour and a half to go pick her up.

No telling what the canines had in mind with the carpet. Our house is just a single-story, so it isn't like they needed to tie the strips together to escape. Boredom will do that for a dog, I guess. Pepper gets bored pretty easily, and I guess she talked Sadie into letting her use some of the carpet to entertain herself.

It's hard to be mad, since the carpet was going to come out anyway. We just weren't planning to do it until we actually had the money to put hardwoods down. If only I could teach them to get a part-time job to help pay for the damage they do. If they weren't so cute and loveable, when they're tired anyway, they would have been given away a long time ago.

But when you come through the door at the end of a stressful day, their sweet faces greet you at the door as if you were the best thing God ever created. What a wonderful thing to come home to. If it hasn't been storming...